October 13, 2017

But he played such a convincing gay guy in Miss Doubtfire

by liberal japonicus

Not meaning to make light of the Harvey Weinstein revelations, but this was funny:

On Oct. 5, The New York Times published a disturbing report detailing sexual harassment allegations against film producer and executive Harvey Weinstein, some of which dated back nearly three decades. After news of the allegations broke, the Weinstein Company fired the 65-year-old movie mogul, who co-founded the studio with his brother, Bob. The claims against Weinstein intensified Tuesday when the New Yorker published an investigative report, written by Ronan Farrow, that detailed rape allegations brought by three women.

Unfortunately, the similar spellings of their surnames have lead many to confuse Weinstein for Fierstein, the legendary actor-playwright of “Torch Song Trilogy” fame and an LGBTQ rights icon.

“I just can’t believe all these accusations of sexual harassment about Harvey Fierstein,” one person wrote. “I always thought he was gay.” Added another: “Am I the only one who confused this weekend because I didn’t know Harvey Weinstein and Harvey Fierstein were two different people?”

I should also add that Fierstein has also noted that "I’ve had some fun with the mix-up but, as you are well aware, the underlying issues of women being objectified is no laughing matter. So I think I am going to bow out of this discussion, stop making jokes, and let that story play itself out without my two cents.”

I have some thoughts about this, but thought we needed to another thread to hijack for gun control. Have at it.

Comments

So if the 2nd Amendment was for states rights vs the Federal government, wouldn't the most visible current manifestation be something like the sanctuary cities movement?

I mean, you've got local government simply declining to give the Feds assistance that they have become accustomed to. So not actually fighting back; more like passive resistance. And apparently sufficiently effective that the traditional enthusiasts for states' rights are going crazy. (Ironically amusing, that.)

gorka, bannon, ingraham. i'm finding the term vermin less and less offensive.

these folks have no respect for popular democratic governance or institutions. they have an agenda, and they are going to do their best to impose it on everyone else.

if your first reaction to that is "lefties do it, too", you are part of the problem. this is not about left vs right. it's about reactionary authoritarianism vs democratic self-governance.

these people are dangerous. they are a threat to the united states as a constitutional republic.

there is no middle here. we're all going to have to pick a side.

easy for me, I don't claim any association with any organization, institution, political party, or freaking bridge club that has anything to do with these creeps.

republicans, conservatives, "family values" folks are going to have to make a choice. I don't think the "I'm a conservative, but not like *those* conservatives" thing has a lot of legs left. I don't think the "I'm a Republican, but not like *those* Republicans" thing has a lot of legs left.

Not your fault, but assholes have stolen your party and your political identity. They're not leaving you any middle ground. Don't look for it, you won't find it. It's no longer there.

grifters and nazis. I'm not speaking metaphorically. reactionary thugs who nurse violent resentful fantasies of violence toward their neighbors and fellow citizens. and not just fantasies. and randian greedheads who think they're fucking ubermenschen deserving of every dime they can scam.

that is the modern conservative movement.

you all are going to have to distance yourselves from them, or get sucked into the mire. they're not going to allow you a middle ground.

you all are going to have to distance yourselves from them, or get sucked into the mire. they're not going to allow you a middle ground.

Thank you for this.

In my spare time I've been helping out on some issues involving immigrants here in VA. Come to find out, the state courts here (assisted by a Republican general assembly) have (arguably - it's still somewhat up in the air) screwed children fleeing violence from Central America.

Kids. The Republican Nazis hate kids. The kids are being treated like "vermin". By the vermin.

I was going to look up Christopher Hitchens' old stuff defending the Kurds, who need defending, against Saddam Hussein, as we were lying to ourselves and embarking on the stupidity AND the artificial stupidity (because our native American stupidity was not sufficient for the job at hand) of the Republican Party's (yes, yes, Clinton voted for it, so it's all HER fault, I guess) invasion of Iraq, but I'm not up to it.

You need a clear definition of "policy" and "win" for this to make any sense at all.

What's true is that some kind of policy will eventually be implemented. What that looks like is an open question.

My larger point is that your party, and your "movement", is full of creeps. Starting right at the top.

As far as "centrists" and "moderates", Lindsay Graham is not a centrist or a moderate. Karl Rove is not by god a centrist or a moderate. Mitch McConnell is not a centrist or a moderate. Paul Ryan is not a centrist or a moderate. Jeff Flake is not a centrist or a moderate.

I think you mistake "centrist" for "not an obvious flaming asshole". Which could apply to Graham or Flake, probably could not apply to the others.

I'm a centrist. Those folks are not.

The POTUS and his circle and all of the folks spouting off at the "Values Summit" are creeps. Greedy vain weirdos, with disordered antisocial personalities and characters.

That's the public face of your party and movement.

Not my circus.

I'm sure it will all be fine.

Actually, what I'm sure of is that you'll get your tax cut. Markets are holding up pretty well, too.

How refreshing it is to have what are ostensibly two sets of "good guys" fighting against each other in Iraq, as opposed to the bad guys that have been fighting against each other in Syria. It's whole 'nother kind of ambiguity.

I am reluctant to give much credit for "our attempt to do something bad failed".

From the perspective of my primary policy concern (summarized as keeping the lights on in the long term without baking the planet or too much other environmental damage), the last nine months have been a disaster. The only good news is that the federal courts are forcing the Administration to go slowly.

My larger point is that your party, and your "movement", is full of creeps. Starting right at the top.

Russell, it's a fair point. But I'm old enough to remember when there were a pretty serious number of creeps in the Democratic Party. (And making similar Bannonite "our way or the highway" comments about them as well.) But the Democratic Party eventually got rid of most of them.

Granted, they never got quite as much of a hold on the Democratic Party as the alt-right et al have gotten on the GOP. But it does suggest that the situation may not be as utterly hopeless as you suggest. Not that it's not bad, but not hopeless.

Krugman is partisan who sold out his actual profession years ago. Calling him an economist is like calling Stephanopoulos a news man, or Trump presidential.

Yeah, well, that's just, like, your opinion, man.

Of course, there's a link that will take you to words you can read. You could read those words and address their meaning directly. You could refute the actual content of the article. It's fairly specific and based in verifiable/refutable assertions of fact.

Marty: Krugman is partisan who sold out his actual profession years ago.

This is why, despite his many charming qualities, Marty is an ass.

Too personal? Tough noogies. I would be delighted to discuss anything with Marty in a civil, impersonal, fact-based way that would not bring a blush to the cheek of the tenderest moderator -- but that would require something like, you know, facts.

I will spot Marty this point: Krugman is indeed a partisan. I say it's because he is a top-notch economist who looks at the facts and concludes that sane people who are not simultaneously rich, selfish, and stupid are ill-served by most of the GOP orthodoxy.

Marty may not agree. Let him present facts supporting his assertion that Krugman "sold out his actual profession years ago", and we can examine them dispassionately -- like the Nobel-level economists we both are.

Policy arguments should lay out the facts, the trade-offs, the priorities, and hence arrive at preferred policy.

Priorities are partisan. If you disagree about priorities you'll prefer different policies.

Krugman's argument is like that. If you disagree with him about who should benefit from tax cuts, you'll disagree with him about the merits of the proposed cuts. Fair enough.

The modern Republican part has discovered a different sort of argument. If the facts are inconvenient, you present alternative 'facts' - it doesn't matter, only a few people are going to do the research to distinguish truth from lies. You eschew any sort of analysis - that's elitist. Instead you jump to a 'gut' conclusion.

The ugly twist is that the Republican politician's gut always tells him to do whatever most benefits the rich.

The ugly twist is that the Republican politician's gut always tells him to do whatever most benefits the rich.

While I don't disagree with this for the national-level Republicans, it's not entirely true for the state- and local-level Republicans in my purplish state. There are assorted reasons why this is the case.

I've long said there was a growing divide between the national Republicans and many of the state Republicans. The ACA repeal debates made that crystal clear -- look at the Republican governors who supported Medicaid expansion.

If all you read of Krugman is is NYT editorials, then yes, it's fair to say that he's "not (much of) an economist". But the fact is that it's near impossible to fit sensible economic analysis into a NYT op-ed piece.

If you read Krugman's blog entries (particularly the ones that he labels as 'WARNING: wonk inside", you'll see that Krugman is indeed a knowledgeable economist.

The MSM doesn't publish detailed supernova nucleosynthesis articles either; if the RW thought they could make milage out of it, the LIGO results would be labeled "fake news" also, too.

The floor remains open for Marty to rebut the points Krugman makes in the NYT piece.

I suppose if it's fair for me to characterize the national (R) leadership as thugs, creeps, and grifters, it's fair for Marty to characterize Krugman as a partisan.

The fact remains that, at the national level, (R)'s are not advancing a tax reform program that is going to be "good for the middle class". They are not advancing anything that is good for the "middle class".

Give it another generation, and there will be no middle class.

The (D)'s don't have that sorted out all that well, either, but at least they're not about kicking people when they're down.

The thing that I see in common among the folks that support people like Trump et al is that they are perfectly happy to see calamity fall on somebody, as long as it's somebody else. I personally have a really freaking hard time looking past that.

People need to wake the hell up. Not "get woke", just wake the hell up. Pay attention. The crap that you're willing to see fall on other folks' heads, is gonna fall on yours, too.

Then what?

Think DJT will have your back? Or McConnell, or Ryan, or any of the Breitbart Lord of the Flies crowd?

If you find yourself in a room cheering on some guy who's talking about all the "damage he's gonna be able to do" to somebody else now that he's "no longer fettered by being in government", you have a problem. You *are* the problem.

If you find yourself cheering the idea that some guy gets sick and dies because he can't afford health insurance, you *are* the problem.

If you find yourself thrilled by the idea that some poor shlub who hoboed here from Guatemala so he wouldn't get killed in some gang BS, worked his ass off for ten years, has a family and a business or a couple of jobs, is now going to be tossed out on his ass, you *are* the problem.

If you see justice and fairness in the idea that kids who were brought here by their parents, who have no memory of living anywhere else, are going to be sent "back" to a country they do not know and whose language they don't even freaking speak, you *are* the problem.

If you think that black people just need to STFU, pull up their socks, and quit bitching about stuff that happened 200 years ago, you *are* the problem.

People need to wake the hell up. This country is not doing so well. The markets are great, the country not so much.

I understand that people are afraid and feel unsettled and insecure. I don't understand the idea that somebody else's life turning into shit is going to make your life any better.

If you find yourself cheering the idea that some guy gets sick and dies because he can't afford health insurance, you *are* the problem.

I confess that, if "some guy" is a Congressman who voted to repeal Obamacare and replace it with nothing, or someone who voted for that Congressman -- OK, I'm probably not actually cheering, but my level of sympathy for his plight is pretty damn limited. Call me callous, or part of the problem, if you must.

My point is that I don't think anyone has a really clear plan for how to restore what was lost with the decline of manufacturing in the US.

I'm not hearing, from either side, a clear story about we get from where we are now, to a place where there is a basis for a braod and robust middle class. By middle class I mean basic financial security and an ability to build modest wealth over a lifetime.

I don't necessarily fault anyone for that, it's a complicated question, the answers to which will probably depend on conditions that don't currently exist and which can't really be predicted.

At a minimum, the (D)'s are committed to preserving a basic safety net. Which puts them head and shoulders above the (R)'s.

If you think I am being unfair to the (D)'s, please take this as your cue to amend my understanding!

wj, my reference is to the (R) presidential debate in 2011 when ron paul was asked a hypothetical question about a healthy 40-year-old who decided to take his chances, forgo insurance, and then got sick.

who should pay, asked wolf blitzer?

in a free society, paul answered, the man would be free to make his own decision and take his own chances.

HRC is doing the rounds here, on lots of political talk shows, getting honorary doctorates etc. It's unbearable listening to her informed, nuanced commentary on world events, and contrasting it with the tangerine fucker-in-chief. I'm guessing almost everybody in the world, with the exception of the Saudis and the Israelis, (and small numbers of never-HRCers such as we have here), feels the same.

p.s. Thanks for all noogie-related responses.

Also, while I'm on, for Nigel and any other UK-based commenters or lurkers, I'm posting a link to Gina Miller's Best for Britain site, which (using your postcode) gives you a tool for checking whether your MP has signed the letter demanding the government release the Brexit Impact Studies, which they are continuing to conceal, and if they have not there is a link for emailing them and demanding, as their constituent, that they do so. According to recent polls, the numbers are finally shifting on Brexit, and although it may be too late to reverse it (but maybe not), it is not too late to start holding the government to account.

" I don't understand the idea that somebody else's life turning into shit is going to make your life any better."

No one wants someone elses life to turn to shit. We would like for state and local government and "you" the individual persons to take responsibility for your community and yourself.

The fundamental disconnect in this discussion year after year is that Democrats/liberals expect all problems to be solved by the federal government because that way people in NY and California(and Massachusetts) get to decide the best way to solve everyone elses problems.

As soon as there is a block grant policy then "20M people will lose insurance", no 20M people wont have insurance paid for by the Federal government. If Kasich wants the money to cover everyone he has a state of 10s of millions of people to raise the money from. And we think he should.

It is tiring to constantly listen to how the Republicans/conservatives are heartless because we believe that there is a better way to solve the problem, and that's just one example.

BTW, this should have ended "like Massachusetts did". The state designed a plan that best supported its constituents that was reasonably successful prior to being preemoted by the ACA to some extent. It would be a really bad plan for say, Texas. but it worked for Mass.

It is tiring to constantly listen to how the Republicans/conservatives are heartless because we believe that there is a better way to solve the problem, and that's just one example.

Kansas is just one example of how Republicans solve problems at the state level.

Then there's California (wildfires aside), a state that recovered nicely when the Democrats took over.

Republicans don't know how to govern. They are, at best, an opposition party. To the extent that they've had a useful function in the last 40 years or so, it was to keep Democrats from over-extending their preferred programs. (That's me being nice, BTW.)

"If you find yourself cheering the idea that some guy gets sick and dies because he can't afford health insurance, you *are* the problem."

Marty:

As soon as there is a block grant policy then "20M people will lose insurance", no 20M people wont have insurance paid for by the Federal government. If Kasich wants the money to cover everyone he has a state of 10s of millions of people to raise the money from. And we think he should."

What part of "we" do you think you are, kemosabe?

"If Kasich wants the money to cover everyone he has a state of 10s of millions of people to raise the money from?"

Not in Ohio, he doesn't.

"It would be a really bad plan for say, Texas."

What is Texas' plan? The last I looked they were electing the guys and gals cheering the sick on as they croaked.

"You mean the people who vote for the majority party, and then find that the broken electoral system gives control of the presidency, the legislature, and the judiciary to the minority party?
And who then get their own back by insisting on being big net funders of the federal government?"

The first half of this is just nonsense, thwarting the tyranny of the majority was specifically the reason for electoral college.

The second half, well it would be awesome if those states don't have to send so much.

And, HSH, there are 35 states in this country run by Republicans to varying extents, pointing out one that has mixed results is not helpful. In fact I would say that most state failures are based on an over dependence on FED money.

I can't the link now, but a republican ... he has a chortle that can be heard over across state lines when the poor expire without health insurance ... is proposing a law at the federal level that, once Obamacare is dead, would prohibit the states from enacting any universal health insurance scheme at the state level.

Good luck to Massachusetts getting any semblance of Romney Universal care back.

Further, the drive to eliminate the deduction of state and local taxes on Federal income tax returns is part and parcel of the Republican Party's overarching strategy to cripple state government spending as well, especially in the blue states who would most likely try to take up the slack once "preexisting conditions" get to be part of their populations lives again, to such an extent that nothing but a bare bones safety net will be fiscally possible at the state and local levels.

The Kochs, the Mercers, and the rest of the usual murderous suspects have been laying down the money at the state and local levels too and electing even more radical legislators at those levels to prevent any move by this mythical "we" Marty thinks he is part of to have a safety net at any level in the United States.

Marty: ... thwarting the tyranny of the majority was specifically the reason for electoral college.

Was it Jefferson, Hamilton, or Franklin who told you that personally?

I find it hard to believe that VA, NY, and PA really wanted to make sure that some underpopulated future states would be able to thwart them, down the road. But if you have private information, civility demands that I pretend to believe you.

Actually, not a few folks are totally fine with it. Happy about it, even. I know this because they say so.

We would like for state and local government and "you" the individual persons to take responsibility for your community and yourself.

As you wish. Best of luck.

The fundamental disconnect in this discussion year after year is that Democrats/liberals expect all problems to be solved by the federal government

Speaking for myself, I like the feds to be involved in issues of national scope.

IMO that covers pretty much all of the issues raised in this thread.

YMMV

I get the personal responsibility thing. I'm actually kind of big on personal responsibility, myself.

When somebody's insistence on Personal Responsibility, complete with capital letters to indicate that it's some kind of unquestionable imperative, means that somebody else gets to die because they were stupid and didn't buy health insurance, I'm less of a fan.

Moderation in all things. Common sense goes a long way.

I'm happy to own the fact that I am a product of the environment I was raised in. NY and New England. Places with strong traditions of common action and purpose. Including via public means.

I have no problem with people doing good and useful things through the instrument of government. That way everybody gets to have it, not just people who have "earned" it.

Schools, roads, libraries, public transportation, basic public infrastructure and services. Not to exclude access to health care, not to exclude access to higher education.

I'm happy when that stuff is available to everyone, and I'm happy to pay for it.

And I understand that not everyone sees it that way, I'm just sick of the nation being freaking wedged over stuff that every other country in the damned world sorted out decades ago.

Because we're saddled with the mythology of the Strong Independent Rugged Individual, who Takes Responsibility For Him Or Herself.

Or, you're saddled with it. I have zero investment in it.

So, screw it. You can lead a horse to water. If it's so important to you to make a point about not being dependent on "Uncle Sugar" that you're happy to freaking die rather than let the feds help out, far be it from me to gainsay it.

The thing is, folks always seem to see things differently when it actually is their behind on the line.

The folks who suddenly think gay marriage is OK when their kid comes out.

The folks who suddenly think the ACA is OK when it pays for their medical care, or their spouse's, or their kids.

The folks who want those illegals deported, except for their next door neighbor. He's one of the good ones, why does he have to go?

And so on and so on.

Whatever. The trend over the last 35 or so years is in your favor. Seize that personal responsibility with both hands, and best of luck to you and yours.

All of that said, the speakers at the Values Summit include some truly horrible human beings, and IMO it's inappropriate for the POTUS to legitimize that soiree with his presence.

Unfortunately for him, that's his base. So I guess he had to take the gig.

The first half of this is just nonsense, thwarting the tyranny of the majority was specifically the reason for electoral college

You're having a laugh. As conceived, the idea of the Electoral College was that "the immediate election should be made by men most capable of analyzing the qualities adapted to the station, and acting under circumstances favorable to deliberation, and to a judicious combination of all the reasons and inducements which were proper to govern their choice."

Nothing like that happens, the meeting of the Electoral College is a formality.

Hamilton went on to write:
"The process of election affords a moral certainty, that the office of President will never fall to the lot of any man who is not in an eminent degree endowed with the requisite qualifications. Talents for low intrigue, and the little arts of popularity, may alone suffice to elevate a man to the first honors in a single State; but it will require other talents, and a different kind of merit, to establish him in the esteem and confidence of the whole Union, or of so considerable a portion of it as would be necessary to make him a successful candidate for the distinguished office of President of the United States. It will not be too strong to say, that there will be a constant probability of seeing the station filled by characters pre-eminent for ability and virtue. And this will be thought no inconsiderable recommendation of the Constitution, by those who are able to estimate the share which the executive in every government must necessarily have in its good or ill administration."

Do you claim that the Electoral College is acting as Hamilton envisaged? Is Trump not exactly the sort of candidate Hamilton intended the Electoral College to exclude?

The way the system operates now, it replaces tyranny of the majority with tyranny of the minority.

And, HSH, there are 35 states in this country run by Republicans to varying extents, pointing out one that has mixed results is not helpful.

Yes, "just one example" - words I borrowed from you, that you used to make your very helpful point about how mean we liberal Democrats are to you poor, downtrodden conservative Republicans, whose party runs 35 states and controls congress and the White House.

"Mixed results" - you're a hoot!

In fact I would say that most state failures are based on an over dependence on FED money.

And I would say over-dependence on Fed money is based on preventing state failures. WTF do you think would happen to the vast majority of the reddest of the red states in this country without Fed money, be it in the form of public assistance, grants to the states, or jobs with federal agencies (or jobs supported by people with jobs with federal agencies who spend their salaries)? You gotta be kidding me.

I think I've mentioned before that whenever I've met people who identify as Republican or rightwing, the main identifying difference that stands out dramatically between them and liberals, or in the US Democrats, is that they lack the imagination to understand the desirability for some publically-provided right, until they or their family need it themselves. (Obviously, this does not apply to only-nominal Republicans like wj.)

Similarly, I have often thought that in order to understand the concept of White Male Privilege, people like McKinney or Marty would have to do something like John Howard Griffin did when he wrote Black Like Me. Wikipedia:

Black Like Me, first published in 1961, is a nonfiction book by white journalist John Howard Griffin recounting his journey in the Deep South of the United States, at a time when African-Americans lived under Racial Segregation. Griffin was a native of Dallas, Texas, who had his skin temporarily darkened to pass as a black man. He traveled for six weeks throughout the racially segregated states of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Arkansas, and Georgia to explore life from the other side of the color line. Sepia Magazine financed the project in exchange for the right to print the account first as a series of articles.
Griffin kept a journal of his experiences; the 188-page diary was the genesis of the book. When he started his project in 1959, race relations in America were particularly strained. The title of the book is taken from the last line of the Langston Hughes poem "Dream Variations".

There always comes a moment in these threads for me in which I have to remind myself, that on a range of issues Marty and McKT are not the individuals I should be arguing with, except that they are the only ones who show up here as volunteers for my abuse.

I exclude charleswt from this because if I called him a republican or even a conservative he would be suitably insulted.

Neither of them are self-professed republicans of the variety I hate with every fiber of my morning fiber intake and I hope they know that.

That the two of them think there is a "we" out there among this exclusionary monstrosity called the republican party they can their own is an illusion.

Just one of each of their moderate views, perhaps McTX's support of gay marriage or Marty's moderate views on gun control, and when he's not talking Obamacare but rather that he thinks healthcare insurance should be available to more citizens one way or another, places them in a wilderness where there is no "we" in the radical conservative movement that runs the show now who wouldn't primary the two in a jiff and question their manhoods, the provenance of their mothers, and their patriotism if they were elected officials.

But if the two of them run into those other ones, please tell them to go fuck themselves for me.

I have yet to encounter anyone (admittedly I don’t personally interact much with the far right) who doesn't see the downside of a President Pence. Pretty clearly he would be more successful in getting bad policies enacted and implemented.

But it's a matter of feeling that the existing alternative is worse. In particular, at least in my case, feeling like Trump could well get us into a war as a result of injured ego and personal pique. Which Pence, for all his shortcomings, seems far less likely to.

No, no, no....stupid applies only to those of dusky hue confined to inner cities and lacking wealth and concomitant opportunity...because they lack "initiative".

Nay, our Midwestern stalwarts are the sons and daughters of right colored folks who stole the land and slaughtered its inhabitants (other dusky hues), resolutely kept those of the incorrect hue from their neighborhoods, and were subsidized to do so (Homestead Act, etc.).

Why, if I didn't know any better....reading (wingnut) musings would lead me to believe that one could repeatedly rape their wives, beat their kids, and kick their dogs, but if, by some miracle, one fine day you stopped doing these horrible things, you could turn to them and sweetly say, "Well, I've stopped doing that terrible stuff. Everything is OK now, right?"